This civil litigation reference has been updated to account for changes in the law since the previous edition published in 2007. It provides guidance for evaluating and conducting motions for summary judgment, for determination of issues before trial and for dismissal without delay.

The Third Edition includes a detailed review of the case law extracting key principles relating to motions, along with everyday practice tips. The text contains practical charts and tables, a trial management checklist under rule 76 and precedents for common pre-trial motions.

Features include:

Expanded and updated Charts of Causes of Action and Defences and their Legal Elements allows the reader to quickly confirm what the appropriate elements of most known causes of action or defences are in order to properly analyze whether to bring, and how to defend, Rule 19, 20, 21 and 76 motions; in both civil and family contexts

Special updated Appendix on the application of summary judgment in matrimonial proceedings

Updated legal precedents – law portions updated in factum for motion to set aside default judgment, factum on summary judgment motion, factum on motion to dismiss an action for delay

Brand new Agreed Statement of Fact precedent – this precedent is combined with a new section in Chapter 7 that discusses the use of ASF as an alternative to using Requests to Admit

New in This Edition

New sections discussing:

Potential Prejudice to the Moving and Responding Parties

Effect of the Order on the Integrity of the Justice System Test to Set Aside Admissions

Alternative to Rule 51

Exchanging Affidavit of Documents

Mandatory Mediation

Pre-Trial Conferences – Rule 50

Setting a Matter Down for Trial

Extensive analysis of the leading Supreme Court of Canada decision, Hryniak v Mauldin, on the new Rule 20 summary judgment and updated Rules and case law in both civil and family context

Significantly revised discussion on Jurisdiction over Extra-provincial Defendants, with analysis of the two part test outlined in the Supreme Court of Canada’s leading decision on assuming jurisdiction: Van Breda v Village Resorts Ltd.

Revised discussion about proceeding directly to the Court of Appeal as a special case with analysis of Ontario Court of Appeal decision, Coady v Law Society of Upper Canada

Discussion of the new rule 23.05 and its requirement for the court to look to rule 57.01 when exercising discretion on costs in the situation of a discontinuance, as explained in Digiuseppe v Todd

Explanation of what constitutes inordinate delay, inexcusable delay and the issue of prejudice under Rule 24 with reference to Ontario Court of Appeal decision: Langenecker v Sauve

Most recent case law and current leading authorities with a specific focus on Ontario

Who Should Buy

Civil Litigation Lawyers – To assist in their litigation practice

Judges – To cite and reference on various points of litigation

Law schools/Libraries – Invaluable addition to any law library and for students to learn about motions

Featured authors

Robert J. Van Kessel

Edwin G. Upenieks

Robert J. Van Kessel

The late Robert J. Van Kessel, B.A. (Hons.), LL.B., spent his entire legal career practising with the partnership of Lawrence, Lawrence, Stevenson, LLP. His practice specialty involved insolvency and commercial litigation matters. Robert wrote prolifically, contributing papers and presentations to the Ontario Bar Association, and authoring or co-authoriing six legal texts. His legal publications include Enforcing Judgments and Orders, Summary Judgment and Dispositions Before Trial, Interim Receivers and Monitors, Dispositions without Trial, and The Law of Fraud. He also assisted with the preparation of the volume "Receivers" in the 2006 edition of LexisNexis Canada's Halsbury's Laws of Canada.

Edwin G. Upenieks

Edwin G. Upenieks, B.Sc (Hons.), LL.B., chairs Lawrences’ Litigation Group, having practised as a litigator since his call to the Bar in 1983. Ed has a breadth and depth of litigation experience and involvement as lead counsel on numerous significant cases, and has been certified by the Law Society of Upper Canada as a Specialist in Civil Litigation since 1998.
Ed is a prolific writer on legal topics and published in 2016 the second edition of Enforcing Judgments and Orders. In 2015 - 2016, Ed served as the elected President of the Ontario Bar Association, representing 17,000 lawyers, law students, professors and judges in Ontario. Ed is also ranked in the Canadian Lexpert Directory for 2018 as a leading litigator.